Build­ing’s fate out soon

The fate of Pt Chevalier’s his­toric com­mu­nity house will soon be known.

The Co-op­er­at­ing Par­ish’s ap­pli­ca­tion for re­source con­sent to re­move Pt Chevalier’s Old Home­stead Com­mu­nity House will be pub­licly no­ti­fied.

It has been stored at a fa­cil­ity in Kumeu af­ter the Auck­land Coun­cil granted tem­po­rary con­sent for it to be re­moved in Novem­ber from its site on Pt Chevalier Rd.

It is be­lieved to have been built more than 100 years ago and could be one of the area’s old­est build­ings. It had be­come di­lap­i­dated and its own­ers have been in talks with the com­mu­nity about build­ing a new fa­cil­ity for years.

Work­ers were in the process of re­mov­ing the build­ing when the coun­cil or­dered them to stop be­cause the home­stead is pro­tected by a rule in the draft Uni­tary Plan cov­er­ing build­ings con­structed be­fore 1944. The rule only came into ef­fect on Septem­ber 30.

The hear­ings com­mit­tee de­cided to open the de­ci­sion on the build­ing’s fu­ture to the pub­lic af­ter find­ing it had sig­nif­i­cant lo­cal her­itage value.

Res­i­dents, churches and com­mu­nity groups have made sub­mis­sions sup­port­ing its re­moval.

‘‘When I came to Pt Chevalier 50 years ago it was an empty derelict build­ing. As it has aged fur­ther it has be­come more of a risk to the pub­lic,’’ Pt Chevalier res­i­dent Cyn­thia Lid­dle wrote.

Some ex­pressed their shock at the coun­cil’s de­ci­sion to halt the re­moval.

‘‘The ac­tions the coun­cil has al­ready taken are cost­ing the par­ish money it can ill af­ford to loose,’’ wrote Fa­ther Mau­rice Ford of the Par­ish of St Fran­cis and St Therese.